When Pfizer and J&J announced that their Alzheimer’s drug, bapineuzumab (bapi), had failed to impact this disease in a major clinical trial, there was disappointment. Surprisingly, there was also a fair degree of criticism that these companies had taken the risk of running late stage studies with bapi. The reason for this criticism was that the mid-stage clinical trials with bapi gave equivocal results and plunging into phase 3 was highly risky. Given the phase 3 outcome, the naysayers felt that their concerns were validated.